“Oh-oh!” Jerry said. “He’s going to try to catch us in the other sloop! And we haven’t got more than a few hundred yards on him yet. This is going to be some race!”
Some race! Sandy realized once again how different the meaning of speed is to a sailor and to a landsman. Here they were, in a gentle breeze on a calm sea, preparing to race for their very lives—and they would probably not sail faster than he could walk!
Consulting the stars, Jerry set a downwind course, and the boat headed slowly but steadily toward the mainland.
“We’d do better on some other point of sail,” Jerry said, “but there’s one consolation.”
“What’s that?” Sandy asked.
“He’s got to sail on the same course we take, so he can’t take advantage of any more favorable wind than the one we get. That, and the fact that the boats are the same, at least puts us on an even footing.”
By now, Jones and a crew member were in the sloop, and were getting the sails up. Sandy watched as the mainsail caught the light from the freighter, followed almost immediately by the jib. The sloop swung about into the trail of light that danced on the water between them and the big ship, and set her sails for a downwind tack.
Small waves whispered softly at the bow, and bubbles gurgled quietly in the wake. The mainsheet hardly pulled at all in Sandy’s hand as the sail caught all the wind there was to catch. Hardly seeming to move at all, the sloop glided slowly ahead in the soft night breeze.
And the toughest race they would ever sail was under way!